Income Tax (Earnings and Pensions) Act 2003 section 87

Other share schemes: eligibility of individuals and material interests

Section 87 ensures that when assessing whether an individual has a "material interest" that could disqualify them from participating in certain tax-advantaged share schemes, specific shareholdings held by trustees of approved profit sharing schemes are ignored.

• When testing whether someone has a "material interest" in a company for the purpose of share scheme eligibility, certain trustee-held shares must be left out of the calculation.
• The shares to be disregarded are those held by trustees of profit sharing schemes approved under the former Schedule 9 to the Income and Corporation Taxes Act 1988, provided the shares have not yet been appropriated (allocated) to any individual participant.
• Any voting or other rights attached to those unappropriated shares that the trustees can exercise are also disregarded.
• This rule applies across four types of tax-advantaged share scheme: Share Incentive Plans, Save As You Earn option schemes, Company Share Option Plan schemes, and Enterprise Management Incentive schemes.